Life isn’t always good! Failure happens in careers, things go wrong, disappointments come, things don’t turn out as you wanted them to. It happens to everybody. Sometimes it can be very hard to keep going in the face of adversity. But it’s how we respond that counts. There is one thing that I have come to know is true, and counts more than anything: how you do things matters more to your success than what you do. Or as someone else once said: “How one plays, and what one plays for – that alone reveals the man.”
Optimism is central to the way I live and work. Always have a glass half full. Be the most hopeful person in the room. I’m not talking about wishful thinking or naivety; but I really believe that the person with the most hope in the room is the person with the most influence. Education is changing, and we are facing challenges – staff and students alike. It can be easy to be overwhelmed at times and tough to see a way through… but the person who finds a way, or solves the problem, makes the difference – is usually the one who believes it can be done. Optimism brings hope and creativity…it’s what the best people convey all the time, especially under pressure. I want our students to believe that they can – so they will.
– Ms Schafer